1. A tsunami is a series of sea waves caused by an underwater earthquake, landslide, or volcanic eruption. More rarely, a tsunami can be generated by a giant meteor impact with the ocean.

2. A tsunami is not just one wave but a series of waves or a “wave train.”

3. Many witnesses say a tsunami sounds like a freight train.

4. When the ocean is deep, tsunamis may be less than a foot high on the ocean’s surface, can travel at speeds up to 500 mph without being noticed and cross the entire ocean in less than a day.

5. Once a tsunami reaches the shallow water near the coast, it slows down. The top of the wave moves faster than the bottom, causing the sea to rise dramatically, as much as 100 feet at times.

6. Tsunami waves can be as long as 60 miles and be as far as an hour apart. These waves can cross entire oceans without losing much energy.

7. Flooding can reach land 1000 feet (300 meters) from the coastline and the dangerous waves have enough force to lift giant boulders, flip vehicles, and demolish houses.

8. Scientists can accurately estimate the time when a tsunami will arrive almost anywhere around the world based on calculations using the depth of the water, distances from one place to another, and the time that the earthquake or other event occurred.

9. Hawaii is the U.S. state at greatest risk for a tsunami – they get about one per year and a damaging one every seven years. The biggest tsunami that occurred Hawaii happened on April 1, 1946, where the coast of Hilo Island was hit with 30 foot waves coming in at 500 miles per hour. 170 people died as a result.

10. In 2004, the Indian Ocean tsunami was caused by an earthquake that is thought to have had the energy of 23,000 atomic bombs. Within hours of the earthquake in 2004, killer waves radiating from the epicenter slammed into the coastline of 11 countries, damaging countries from east Africa to Thailand. By the end of the day, the tsunami had already killed 150,000 people. The final death toll was 283,000.

11. Not counting the 2011 tsunami in Japan, there were 26 tsunamis that killed at least 200 people or more in the last century.

Wednesday, February 27, 2013

The architects of our economic demisePart I: Aldrich-Vreeland Act, Federal Reserve, Jekyll Island
Doug Hagmann
Wednesday, February 27, 2013 http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/53400?utm_source=CFP+Mailout&utm_campaign=c0fc02e287-Call_to_Champions&utm_medium=email
Today, we are witnessing the final stages of the greatest financial fraud ever perpetrated on the American people. Behind the massive debt, threat of “sequestration,” and the threat of massive pending layoffs exists a story that must be told and understood by every American. It is a truth that too few understand and even fewer will talk about.
The system has been rigged. However, understanding exactly what is being done to us, our country, and our economy has been deliberately made difficult for a person of average or even above-average intelligence by the architects of our demise. This process continues today, and much of it is done in secret or behind closed doors.
Every person on the planet is being robbed of their wealth by a select group of people. Worse, they are robbing your children, grandchildren, and further generations of their wealth not yet earned and (by extension) their time not yet invested, while making you believe that their enrichment is your moral obligation. It’s mental conditioning on a grand scale.How we got here
A significant aspect of understanding why we find ourselves in our current financial mess is to understand exactly how we got here in the first place. Like most events taking place in Washington, DC, we are witnessing the ongoing shredding of the United States Constitution by both sides of the political divide. Yet how many people actually understand that what is taking place is completely unconstitutional? Thanks to the incremental infusion of Communist goals into the legal and societal framework of the fabric of America, people have been intellectually hobbled by a complicit media and a compromised educational system.
Discarding revisionist history and knowing the truth behind the larger global scheme will tell us, by default, what we must do to get out of the mess we’re in, and identify those who are responsible, both past and present.
The founders of our country fought a difficult war of independence to break free of the constraint and oppression of England. The blood that was shed on the battlefield over two centuries ago resulted in the creation of our Constitution.
Article I, Section 8, Part 5 of the United States Constitution states that “[T]he Congress shall have the power to coin money, regulate the value thereof…” Yet, that has been violated to the detriment of all Americans. So, what is the truth?
There is a rich history of our country’s monetary system, and significant events that occurred before the twentieth century. For example, why have some of the real factors for the War of 1812 been expunged from our history books? There is no mention of our forefathers’ refusal to permit a central bank to run America, thereby creating antagonism with England. What were the causes of the previous financial panics that struck America in her early years? History has been revised. But for the sake of brevity, we’ll begin with the events of last century and end with the present.In all conspiracies, there must be great secrecy
In response to a Wall Street orchestrated financial panic in 1907 that saw a 50% fall in the stock market, a National Monetary Commission was created by the U.S. Congress in 1908 and signed into law by President Theodore Roosevelt. It was a “study group,” ostensibly to prevent further

financial panics and economic troubles. Known as the Aldrich-Vreeland Act, it was a Republican-led initiative introduced by Senator Nelson Aldrich. It is important to note that Senator Aldrich was a business associate of J.P. Morgan, and the father-in-law of John D. Rockefeller. He was ultimately named head of the National Monetary Commission, a group that spent two years in Europe studying the structure of their banking and financial system.

Two years later, and under the cover of darkness, a meeting of about a half-dozen of the wealthiest people in America took place amid great secrecy on an island just off the coast of Georgia. The meeting was set up by Aldrich himself and held on Jekyll Island, which was purchased in 1888 by J.P. Morgan and William Rockefeller (the brother of John D. Rockefeller).
Late on the night of November 22, 1910, Senator Nelson Aldrich, his personal secretary, and six of the wealthiest men in the world[ia] stealthily boarded Aldrich’s personal rail car in Hoboken, New Jersey to make a trip of nearly a thousand miles to this remote location, where no media or others outside of this clique were allowed.
In addition to Aldrich and his personal secretary, the other men who secretly boarded that rail car included A. Piatt Andrew (the Assistant Secretary to the U.S. Treasury, and Special Assistant to the National Monetary Commission),Frank Vanderlip (President of the National City Bank of New York), Henry P. Davison (senior partner at J.P. Morgan Company, and considered Morgan’s personal emissary), Charles D. Norton (President of the First National Bank of New York, a Morgan dominated bank), Benjamin Strong (also of J.P. Morgan), and Paul Warburg (a German immigrant working for Kuhn, Loeb and Company).[ii]
The unprecedented secrecy surrounding this nine-day conference on Jekyll Island was such that the attendees were only permitted to use first names of others, causing some to refer to the group as “The First Name Club.” Unbeknownst to all Americans, the framework was being set for the greatest financial Ponzi scheme that still exists today.The Federal Reserve Act of 1913

As a result of that secret meeting on Jekyll Island in 1910, the Federal Reserve (or “Fed”) was created after a three-year long magic act designed to fool the American people into believing that the Federal Reserve was something it was not. On December 23, 1913, President Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act into law after it passed in a nearly empty Capitol chamber,since many lawmakers had already departed for the Christmas holiday.

It is important to understand that, during the three years between the meeting at Jekyll Island and the passage of the Federal Reserve Act, there is a rich history of deception and subterfuge. This included influencing the presidential election that brought Woodrow Wilson (governor of New Jersey, and former president of Princeton University) into office, over popular incumbent William Howard Taft. Historians could rightfully assert that the primary (and perhaps only) purpose of getting Wilson elected as U.S. President at this time was in order to assure that a central banking system would be signed into law.
President William Howard Taft was the incumbent, and favored for re-election. The Republicans also held a majority in both houses of Congress. It was not until the former Republican President Theodore Roosevelt (the creator of the National Monetary Commission) entered the race as a third party candidate that Taft was threatened. Roosevelt was highly funded by members of both parties who wanted a central banking system put in place in the United States. The entry of Theodore Roosevelt split the vote, and Woodrow Wilson was elected.
Two figures who played a very prominent role in the creation of a central bank, and the passage of the Federal Reserve Act behind the scenes, were Paul Warburg (a German immigrant) and Colonel Edward Mandel House from Texas. Both had European connections. House was a friend of he most powerful man in America at that time - President Woodrow Wilson. He also had connections to the Rothschild money dynasty in London. The influence of Colonel House over two presidential administrations is without question. Accordingly, he and his ideology warrant a closer look.
“Colonel” is only a nickname, as he had no military experience, just an odd and influential friendship with U.S. President Woodrow Wilson. House was active in Texas politics, and became an advisor to Wilson in foreign affairs. Much like today, access to the President appears to hinge on “excess,” or how much money one has. According to one account, House reportedly showed up at the Wilson White House with a $35,000 political contribution.[iii]
In 1911, House anonymously published a novel titled Philip Dru: Administrator, in which the main character causes a civil war in the United States and then becomes a dictator. As dictator, the character Dru turns the U.S. into a Socialist nation - a Socialist utopia, as dreamed by Karl Marx. The cumbersome novel seemed to serve as a blueprint for President Wilson. Then later,it influenced President Roosevelt, in terms of the implementation of socialist programs.
It is interesting that House, an avowed Socialist, viewed the enactment of the Federal Reserve as the crowning achievement of the Wilson administration.[iv] Among other decidedly Socialist “reforms,” House (personally and through his novel) actually called for the creation of the Federal Reserve, or a central banking system.[v] A centralized banking system, along with a progressive or graduated income tax, is one of the ten planks of the Communist goals.What’s in a name?
Before the Federal Reserve Act was signed into law, it was initially known as the Aldrich Plan, named after Senator Nelson Aldrich. To positively impact public opinion, national banks organized a propaganda campaign through three American Universities: Princeton, Harvard, and the University of Chicago. The banks contributed $5 million to this propaganda campaign, much of it spent by the National Citizens’ League, an organization composed primarily of college professors.
As facets of the Republican Aldrich Plan became known, however, there was staunch opposition launched against it by Democrats, who presented their own plan in the form of the Federal Reserve Act. It is here - at this point in American history - that the Republican-Democrat political paradigm seems to have been essentially and forever dissolved. Much print space could be dedicated to this time period in history alone, that would enlighten readers to the collusion between parties at their highest and most powerful levels, in order to fool the American people.
Perhaps one of the most disingenuous feats during this period was this inter-party collusion for the centralization and control of our national monetary system. The illusion of dueling plans was thrust upon the American people by a simple name change. The Aldrich plan was associated with the Republicans. The Federal Reserve plan was associated with the Democratic party. The difference was in name only.
Despite the identical nature of the plans, those pushing for a central banking system made it appear that they were at odds with each other. Aldrich joined with Frank Vanderlip, president of the National City Bank, to publicly denounce the Federal Reserve Act.
The people of the United States had fought previously against the implementation of a central banking system under Presidents Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson, when the Rothschild family attempted to install such a system (and briefly succeeded via The First Bank of the United States and the Second National Bank, respectively). Therefore, the advocates of the Federal Reserve Act wanted

to hide the fact that it was really a centralized banking system.

Accordingly, one of the architects at Jekyll Island, Paul Warburg, devised the plan to set up a series of regional banks throughout the U.S., in order to make it appear that the Federal Reserve was not a central bank. Additionally, Warburg also seemed to alleviate concerns over who would oversee the appointments to head the Federal Reserve by making it appear that the U.S. government had full authority over such appointments. Actually, appointments were (and are) made from a list of “acceptable candidates” provided by the Federal Reserve alone.
After the political theater that made it appear that the Republicans and Democrats were at odds with each other, the objective of the architects of a central banking system prevailed. As previously noted, the Federal Reserve Act was signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson on December 23, 1913.
Wilson apparently realized what he had done. In 1916, Wilson wrote, “Our system of credit is concentrated [in the Federal Reserve]. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities, are in the hands of a few men.”London bridges
The creation of the Federal Reserve concentrated the power, wealth, and industry of the United States into the control of a handful of people, including J.P. Morgan who was (for all practical purposes) an emissary for the Rockefeller dynasty. But it was not only the Rockefellers who benefitted from this devious plan; the Rothschild family of London also controlled the wealth of the U.S. by proxy. The Rothschilds also took over the Vatican Bank in 1824.
It is becoming clear that all roads and bridges lead to the bankers of London. Not just to London, but a specific area within London—a city within a city. It is within this magical mile where the root of untold wealth and power exists. It is here where its denizens control men and might, plan wars and “a New World Order.”
Accordingly, honest investigation into the creation and continued existence of the Federal Reserve must include identifying the people behind its creation, as well as its current existence.“Thou doth protest too much”

Additionally, honest investigation and research into the Federal Reserve, past and present, would not be complete without looking at its “protagonist threats” and their fates. Examples can be found in President Abraham Lincoln (who issued “Greenbacks”), President James A. Garfield (who suggested serious monetary reforms just before his assassination in 1881), and of course, President John F. Kennedy.

It is applicable to introduce Louis Thomas McFadden, a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives serving from 1923 to 1935. He was a member of the House Banking and Currency Committee, and had a working understanding of what the central bankers and the power elite were doing to the United States.
On June 10, 1932, Rep. McFadden addressed the House of Representatives with this important message [emphasis added]:
“Some people think the Federal Reserve banks are United States Government institutions. They are not government institutions. They are private credit monopolies which prey upon the people of the United States for the benefit of themselves and their foreign customers. The Federal Reserve banks are the agents of the foreign central banks. Henry Ford has said, ‘The one aim of these financiers is world control by the creation of inextinguishable debts.’ The truth is the Federal Reserve Board has usurped the Government of the United States by the arrogant credit monopoly which operates the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Banks.”
Based on his analysis of the treachery taking place by the Federal Reserve and its enablers, McFadden introduced House Resolution No. 158, Articles of Impeachment on May 23, 1933 against the Secretary of the Treasury and two Assistant Secretaries of the Treasury; the Federal Reserve Board of Governors and the officers and directors of the Federal Reserve Banks for their guilt and collusion in causing the Great Depression.
McFadden stated: “I charge them with having unlawfully taken over 80 billion dollars from the United States Government in the year 1928, the said unlawful taking consisting of the unlawful recreation of claims against the United States Treasury to the extent of over 80 billion dollars in the year 1928, and in each year subsequent, and by having robbed the United States Government and the people of the United States by their theft and sale of the gold reserve of the United States.”
Rather than a bullet, McFadden was instead marginalized by rumors that he was legally insane. The Progressives of that era heavily funded his political opposition. Between the allegations of his insanity and the money furnished to his opposition, McFadden lost his congressional district and faded into relative obscurity. The impeachment resolution never saw the light of day.Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Quietly backed by the Socialist and Communist parties, Roosevelt was elected President in 1932, ostensibly to end Wall Street domination and free the American people from the evil domestic banking cartel and its equally evil international influences that caused the Great Depression.
But who was Roosevelt? He was himself was an international banker who floated large issuances of foreign bonds in the U.S. during the 1920s. He was also the was President and Director of United European Investors, Ltd., which also floated millions of German marks in this country. Like the pattern we have witnessed more recently, the bonds defaulted and Americans collectively lost millions of dollars.
Perhaps most telling were his associations. Upon taking office, Roosevelt appointed James Paul Warburg, son of Paul Warburg, as Director of the Budget and Vice President of the International Acceptance Bank and other corporations.
Moving quickly through history, there were a number of significant events related to the Federal Reserve and our economy that brought us to this most dangerous point in history.Glass-Steagall Banking Act of 1933

Partly due to the Great Depression, the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933 essentially separated commercial and investment activities by banks.Enacted in part as a result of the findings of the Pecora Commission, an investigation of the events that led to the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and the Great Depression, the commission’s findings led to the Glass-Steagall Banking Act.

When the White House pressed Carson for a copy of his upcoming speech at last month’s National Prayer Breakfast gathering, Carson responded several times by telling them it wasn’t available.

“Dr. Ben Carson rebuffed multiple requests from the White House for an advance copy of his speech for the National Prayer Breakfast earlier this month, a speech in which he criticized President Barack Obama sitting just a few feet away.

“Carson told The Hill he told the White House no, because he doesn’t put his remarks on paper beforehand.

“I told them that I don’t have an advance copy because I don’t write out my speeches and I don’t use teleprompters …they asked more than once … I gave them the [Biblical] texts around which the remarks would be framed … I said read those texts, the remarks will be framed around those … that should have told them something.”

The White House didn’t comment on Carson’s disclosure.

The retiring pediatric neurosurgeon, who has been besieged by requests to run for political office, will be speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference this month.

In other words, the popular Carson hit the White House the same way it usually hits We the People: on the sly.

Woodward, Davis and all others who dare criticize Obama policies should take the same trip down Memory Lane that Canada Free Press (CFP) letter to the editor writer Helena Bradley did this morning.

“Antonio Gramsci—the originally fiery orthodox Bolshevik Italian who gave birth to the so-called “Western-Marxism”, along with Bolshevism the two main strains of Marxism-Leninism—advised his followers that, once in overall power, they should return to their Bolshevik roots to govern and to secure staying in power, although, if necessary or just for appearances, they should still keep using the tools of democracy that they used to reach power, and also keep employing, as needed, any pragmatism (e.g. resorting to fascism, or just to Keynesianism and so forth) that may be suitable to the sought goals,” Bradley wrote.

“So along with the line of returning to Bolshevism, Obama has, since the beginning of his occupation of the White House, taken it as routine to terrorize with terrible threats individuals and institutions that dissent from his ideology, politics or policies.

“Remember how, on Friday, April 3, 2009, he menaced the CEOs from 13 of the nation’s biggest banks to force them into accepting “stimulus” funds with the not so veiled Bolshevik-style threat, “My administration is the only thing between you and the pitchforks…”

“Remember how he made such a threat good when, for instance, on May 1, 2010, Obama unleashed a mob of more than 700 goons from Organizing for America—originally Obama’s main hardcore-left activism organization based on the Nazi “Brown Shirts”, and, now, organically, a branch of the Democrat Party since the very day after Obama finagled getting elected the first time—along with mobs from the SEIU, National People’s Action, and MoveOn.org, to lay siege to the house of Bank of America deputy general counsel Gregory Baer. The hoodlums that had laid the siege didn’t give any consideration that—during the entire time they had Baer’s home surrounded—the only occupants in the house, it’s said, were Baer’s pre-teen children and a female caretaker?”

Yet, the far left and their supporters ride free on that bus called ‘We’re the Natural Defenders of Helpless Women and Children’.

Dear Leaders throughout history are always the same and Bolsheviks famously and violently some day turn on their own.

Lavrentiy Beriya transmitted Stalin’s order to Pavel Sudoplatov to arrange for the gross assassination of Leon Trotsky whenever and wherever he be caught. Ramón Mercader caught him in Mexico City, killing him by a stroke to the head with an ice-ax..thus converting The Hammer & Sickle into The Hammer & Ice-Ax,” Bradley reminds us.

It should go without saying that no matter how celebrated the journalists daring to question Obama’s Marxist policy should use a little more moxie and keep their powder dry.

Describing how a government official yelled down telephone lines at you for half an hour or contending later that maybe Obama didn’t know about it, won’t cut it.

Be like Dr. Ben Carson: Don’t talk about the message. Deliver it and talk about how you did it only after the deed is done.

Judi McLeod is an award-winning journalist with 30 years’ experience in the print media. A former Toronto Sun columnist, she also worked for the Kingston Whig Standard. Her work has appeared on Rush Limbaugh, Newsmax.com, Drudge Report, Foxnews.com, and Glenn Beck.

February 7, 2013 - One of the more unique speeches
delivered at this morning's National Prayer Breakfast came from Dr. Benjamin S.
Carson, a world-renowned pediatric neurosurgeon at Johns Hopkins Hospital.
Taking the stage before President Barack Obama's faith-filled address, Carson
spoke for more than 25 minutes, tackling issues ranging from education to
personal responsibility. His keynote, while predicated upon the theme of Jesus
Christ as his ultimate role model, also took a starkly political tone,
advocating against some of the very policies the president has implemented. At
the beginning of his speech, Carson shared an intense disdain for political
correctness. Without getting too specific on the issue front, he said that
Americans should stop being afraid to speak up and defend their beliefs; he also
encouraged people to respect the individuals they disagree with. Carson held
little back, condemning political correctness as "a horrible thing" that is
"dangerous," as it hampers freedom of thought and expression.

"We've
reached a point where people are actually afraid to talk about what they want to
say, because somebody might be offended," Carson said, noting the example of
people refraining from saying "Merry Christmas." "We've got to get over this
sensitivity and it keeps people from saying what they really believe." Carson
encouraged discussion about societal issues, also pointing out education as an
essential conundrum the country needs to confront. He highlighted his own path
from poverty to success, sharing very personal details about his parents and
early family life and subsequently described the importance of helping students
seeking to advance academically through his Carson Scholars Fund.

The
speech took an interesting turn when the doctor cautioned that moral decay and
fiscal irresponsibility can have dire consequences, even for powerful
countries like America. Here, he became even more pointed and
impassioned.

While
he said America's issues are dire, he was positive that the nation can fix its
ways, as there are bright and innovative people who simply need to come together
to address the problems at hand. "And one of our big problems right now...our
deficit is a big problem," he said, as Obama watched him intently. "Think about
it” and our national debt
at "$16 and a half trillion dollars." To illustrate just how massive the debt
is, Carson told the audience that if they counted one number per second, it
would take them 507,000 years to get to the sum total. The doctor said that the
massive fiscal blunder is something that the nation must contend with. From
there, he moved on to taxation, seemingly taking a stance in direct opposition
to Obama's.

"What about our taxation system so complex there is no
one that can possibly comply with every jot and tittle," he noted, going on to
call for a simpler (i.e. flat tax) system. "When I pick up my Bible, you know
what I see? ” I see the fairest individual in the universe!” God and he's
given us a system. It's called tithe." Carson progressed, seemingly comparing
the tithe, at least in principal, to the flat tax system. Rather than continuing
to tier taxes owed, he argued that everyone should pay the same proportion and
that, through this fairer system, money sent by wealthier Americans for
protection abroad should be brought back to America to help build infrastructure
and create additional jobs. The doctor also addressed medical care, advocating
for health savings
accounts and railing against the notion that Americans should be sending money
into a large bureaucratic system.

“Despite more than sixty years of government efforts—representing the work of both political parties—we are moving further and further away from what we want. Prices are higher, more people are excluded from needed care, more excess treatments are performed, and more people die from preventable errors. Why?”

Why, indeed! Having had the Affordable Care Act (ACA) forced on us by a Democrat-controlled Congress—some of whom had to be bribed for their vote—Americans are beginning to learn that the cost of healthcare is going to increase, people will be laid off, have their hours reduced, or simply not hired at all as the result of this horrid new law.

A February 25 Rasmussen poll revealed that “Most voters still believe that President Obama’s national health law will cost more than official estimates and expect it to drive up the cost of health care in America.” They’re right!

David Goldhill has performed a national service with his new book, “Catastrophic Care: How American Health Care Killed My Father and How to Fix It.” ($25.95, Alfred A. Knopf) Goldhill is the president and chief executive officer of GSN, which operates a U.S. cable television network seen in more than 75 million homes and is one of the world’s largest digital games companies. He came to the issues of healthcare in the wake of his father’s death.

“Although his death was a deeply personal and unique tragedy for me and my family, my dad was merely one of a hundred thousand Americans who died that year as the result of infections picked up in hospitals. A hundred thousand preventable deaths! That’s more than double the annual number of people killed in car crashes, five times the number murdered, twenty 9/11s. Each and every year!”

“All of the actors in health care want to serve patients well, but understandably most respond rationally to the backward economic incentives baked into the system,” writes Goldhill. “At the heart of these perverse incentives is insurance. Unlike with everything else in the economy we rely on insurance as the sole means of paying for everything in health care—from the most routine to the most urgent.”

Noting that “Our massive and failing Medicare and Medicaid programs are already unsustainable and unfixable”, a fact known to anyone paying any attention, Goldhill gets to the heart of Obamacare, whose “central thrust is for ever more insurance to pay for health care.” The result is that “the underlying insurance-based structure of our health care system drives excess treatment, cost inflation, and medical errors.”

There are many myths about healthcare that have become embedded in our society. Goldhill notes that “The factors that most predict your health are your wealth, education, and lifestyle—not your access to health care.” This might seem self-evident, but we live in a nation where we are constantly hectored regarding our lifestyle choices; what and how much we eat, whether we exercise sufficiently, and endless articles suggesting that diseases and illness is predicated, not on our genetic liabilities (if you come from a family with a history of heart disease or cancer), but on the literal invention of new ailments driven by pharmaceutical innovations to “cure” them.

“The ACA (Obamacare) is fundamentally a health insurance bill, not a real piece of health care reform legislation, focusing as it does on the wrapper of insurance rather than on the complex and dysfunctional system inside.”

To understand where we are today, we need to understand that so-called health insurance is “a payment mechanism for health care”, not the health care itself.

To understand where we are today, we need to understand that so-called health insurance is “a payment mechanism for health care”, not the health care itself. It influences that nature of the actual healthcare being provided. Moreover, “The U.S. health insurance companies employ over a half a million workers. That’s one worker for every two doctors. The administrative cost of managing our system of health care payments alone is almost $1,000 per American household. For most Americans, their annual share of this administrative cost exceeds the amount of actual health care they use in a typical year.”

“It is estimated that over the next decade the ACA will cost the government at least $1 trillion and the uninsured themselves the same amount,” says Goldhill. It’s worth keeping in mind at this point that the U.S. is $16 trillion in debt already and Medicare is widely understood to be underfunded; in part because $716 billion was taken from it to fund the imposition of ACA on the nation.

“In any given year, the most costly five percent of people account for more than fifty percent of health-care costs, and the top ten percent of people account for seventy percent of costs.” In effect this means that insurance is the mechanism “for moving funds from the many well to the few ill.” As a result, Medicare and the insurance companies become “surrogates” who “negotiate prices and preapprove procedures” and “they increasingly determine your choice of doctors.”

Goldhill notes that “there are plenty of government aid programs—food stamps, welfare, Social Security—in which the government doesn’t determine how we will spend its money, must less the prices of goods and services and from whom we can buy them.”

The kicker is that “health insurers can achieve long term profit growth only if the amount of money spent on health care increases.”

Goldhill concludes that “Overall, the surrogates have done a miserable job of regulating the system’s quality, safety, and price.”

That is where we are today and it will get worse in the future. And our lives depend on the present system.

I was just handed the Phreesia computer tablet by the receptionist under the guise of updating my medical and insurance information. I had seen this orange notebook in another doctor’s office and I became suspicious. Is this really meant to verify, as the website claims, my insurance eligibility automatically and help doctors collect on their insurance while easing the load of paperwork? Or is it forced electronic data compliance to Obamacare?

﻿

As soon as I started reading each screen, I realized that it was asking me to consent to third parties to obtain my medication prescription history from my pharmacy and to my entire medical history.

I had the right to request and restrict as to how my protected health information was used or disclosed. However, when I declined to sign, the computer stopped, and prompted me to talk to the receptionist. She informed me that diagnosis and/or treatment “may be conditioned upon my consent.”

The electronic screen and the paper copy the receptionist gave me said, “The [name withheld] is not required to agree to the restrictions that I may request and may refuse treatment based on my restriction as permitted by Section 164.506 of the Code of Federal Regulations.”

Suddenly, because I refused the IRS and HHS meddling in my personal health affairs, I had become persona-non-grata (unwanted person) to my doctor who had sworn a Hippocratic Oath to care for me and any patient who comes across his/her path.

In other words, I would not be treated if I did not sign yes. I had the right to say no, don’t give my medical information and history to anyone else but the doctor is not required to honor my request and

What if I said no, do not release my medical history to a third unapproved party and I paid cash? The doctor would not see me. Welcome to the destruction of our stellar healthcare and patient/doctor confidentiality, compliments of Obamacare.

How affordable is this Obamacare, the unfortunately named, the Affordable Care Act? The Democrats and the President said that costs would be so much lower; it would save the typical family $2,500 per year.

The cheapest category of Obamacare is the Bronze Plan which costs $20,000 per year for a family of two adults and three children and it pays only 60% of medical costs after the deductibles for the year have been met. And the deductibles are high per person and per family. The following tiers are Silver (70%), Gold (80%), and Platinum (90%).

During my 30-year teaching career, I seldom had to pay more than $3,600 a year premium for private insurance for my family. Even a retirement private plan did not cost more than $8,000 per year with 80% reimbursement as opposed to only 60% reimbursement under the Obamacare Bronze Plan. Is Obamacare really affordable? The answer is a resounding no.

According to the IRS, the penalty for not buying insurance is capped for now at either the annual Bronze premium, 2.5% of taxable income, or $2,085 per family in 2016.

President Obama said, “If you are one of the more than 250 million Americans who already have health insurance, you will keep your insurance.” Heritage’s Amy Payne estimated that “more than 11 million people will no longer have their employer-sponsored health coverage once Obamacare is fully implemented.” (Businesses Cutting Hours, Bracing for Costs of Obamacare, December 6, 2012)

The Obamacare employer mandate is killing jobs

The Obamacare employer mandate is killing jobs. An employer with 50 employees must provide coverage or pay a $2,000 penalty for each employee after the first 30 workers. It is easy to see how an employer would have to cut back employees to 30, replacing full-time employees with part-time ones, in order to avoid the penalty or the skyrocketing premiums for private coverage. These private insurance premiums rose significantly because Obamacare mandates insurance for all children up to 26 years old and for those insured with pre-existing conditions whose treatment can be costly.

Breitbart News reported that Pennsylvania Community College of Allegheny County had already cut the hours of 400 adjunct professors, staff, and part-time teachers, saving $6 million in potential Obamacare fees. (Wynton Hall, Obamacare Layoffs, Hiring Freezes Begin, January 5, 2013)

Everybody’s private insurance has been disrupted and private premiums have escalated, in addition to adding the “Cadillac tax” to plans that are judged too generous. According to Jonathan Gruber of MIT and the actuarial firm Milliman, non-group premiums rose 19-30% in some states and 55-85% in others.

The federal government has built a data hub to be used only for Obamacare without saying how it will be run. The HHS has released 13,000 pages of regulations with only 30 days for public comment while attempting to re-engineer 17% of the economy. (WSJ, It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad Obamacare, December 13, 2012)

On the deadline of December 14, 2012 states had to declare health insurance exchanges. At that time, only six states (Colorado, Massachusetts, Maryland, Oregon, and Washington) received conditional approval from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to operate their own exchanges. Twenty-six states stated that they will not set up exchanges.

If a state operates its own exchange, it must come up in 2015 with its own source of revenue to run the exchange, making a state a vendor to HHS. The state running an exchange must also expand Medicaid to “able-bodied, low-income, childless adults” in spite of the fact that the Supreme Court ruled the Medicaid expansion voluntary. The federal government was not planning on covering the full cost of such Medicaid expansion. “Half of the reduction in the number of uninsured promised under Obamacare was based on mandating that states expand Medicaid.” (Heritage’s Morning Bell, December 13, 2012)

Several states asked Kathleen Sibelius, the HHS Secretary, if they could expand Medicaid less. The answer was that only full compliance with the law will garner 90% reimbursement from the federal government. Nine states have refused to expand Medicaid to cover new populations. The feds will set up their own exchanges in those states but final regulations and specifics for the federal exchanges are not made public yet. Oklahoma and Maine have sued over Medicaid expansion and over statutory language and Medicaid expansion, respectively.

Three deadline extensions of implementing health exchanges have passed. Most states will share responsibilities with the federal government or default to a federal-run exchange. Only a minority of states have agreed to run their own exchanges.

A 3.5 percent administrative fee on coverage sold through federally-run exchanges will be levied. An additional $63 fee per employee must be paid in federal fees to cover people with pre-existing conditions.

Government funds will be set aside to promote/advertise [on primetime] Obamacare. Critics of the unaffordable health care law call such advertising “political advocacy.”

Practicing medicine will become more and less a government-run monopoly instead of the current monopolistic competition where patients are free to choose what doctors they go to, based on preference, doctor qualifications, specialty, reputation, insurance types, and premiums they choose to pay.

Doctors will either merge with hospitals, insurance companies, and specialty management firms or become “concierge” doctors, serving a reduced number of patients for a set fee. Consolidation will have a negative effect on patient access, price, and competition. Mergers in the 1980s and 1990s had negative effects in terms of patients being restricted or blocked from access to specialists and procedures.

Medicare is already in trouble. Taking $719 billion over ten years from Medicare to fund Obamacare will exacerbate financial problems. Medicare benefits are not a return on taxes paid into the system over time because Medicare is run as “pay as you go” - today’s wage earners pay taxes to fund benefits for today’s retirees. Since people live longer, “Medicare payroll taxes cover only 38 percent of current benefits.” (Rep. Wally Herger)

Obamacare depends on bringing young, healthy people into insurance markets to help offset the costs of insuring the old and the sick. If young people do not participate in the program and elect to pay the fine instead, Obamacare will not be able to make coverage affordable for the uninsured.

Most young Americans do not have insurance. Young people who do have insurance purchase less coverage. Under Obamcare, young Americans must get more coverage and pay more whether they want the added coverage or not. Private insurers have increased their premiums because the law prohibits them from rejecting the sick, and are no longer allowed to charge higher premiums to older customers. Premiums for a young, healthy male could go up as much as three times. Young adults could then opt out of private coverage, causing the market to implode. (Washington Post, Insurers Warn of Health Law ‘Rate Shock,’ N.C. Aizenman, February 16, 2013)

To make matters worse, government officials announced on February 15, 2013 that state-based “high-risk pools” under Obamacare will be closed to new applicants on February 16 through March 2, depending on the state, because funding is running low. The existing 100,000 enrollees will not be affected. If the funding is running low now, what will happen by the time Obamacare is fully in force?

There is a glitch in Obamacare that could leave more than 500,000 children uninsured. Congress defined “affordable” in the Affordable Care Act as coverage not exceeding 9.5 % of family income. If people have coverage that fall under this 9.5% affordable, they cannot get subsidies to go into new insurance markets. This restriction was put into place to prevent people from switching from employer coverage to exchanges in droves. “Affordable” was calculated based on self-only, individual worker, with an average market cost of $5,600. But the current market family coverage, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, is $15,700 per year. IRS announced on January 30, 2013, that employers are not required to pay for dependents, leaving the employee to pay the family premium since he/she will be locked out of subsidies in the federal exchanges.

Betsey McCaughey wrote that Congressional Budget Office (CBO) prediction that Obamacare would leave only 30 million people uninsured in 2016 was predicated on the assumption that kids would be covered by employees. If a parent is covered at work, no subsidies will be provided for the child in the health exchange.

Millions of people will remain uninsured because their states are choosing [wisely] not to expand Medicaid. The states do not have the money to expand Medicaid.

By the time the uninsured will be counted, almost as many Americans (40 million plus) will be left without insurance as the number of uninsured before the Democrats passed their signature monstrosity, the Affordable Care Act. Having sat in a drawer for decades, the bill was dusted off, repackaged, and polished. Nobody took the time to publicly debate or read the bill that passed after some arm-twisting. The Democrats, who had promised free health care for all, feverishly proceeded to spend trillions of dollars we did not have to re-engineer our health care system in the name of social justice.

The states that refuse to set up health exchanges are expected to sell the government-mandated plans and to give out taxpayer-funded subsidies to those who enroll. Betsey McCaughey identifies the glitch:

“The law says that in states that refuse, the federal government can set up an exchange. But the law empowers only state exchanges, not federal ones, to hand out subsidies. The Obama administration says it will disregard the law and offer subsidies in all 50 states anyway, but the case will likely go to the Supreme Court.”

To safeguard from disaster, take care of your body, eat right, exercise if you can, and pray very hard that you will not get sick. There is a good chance that there will not be enough highly qualified doctors to deliver care when needed even if you do have insurance. Should you need specialists, expensive drugs or surgery, you are out of luck. Rationing will tell you, “no, you can’t have it.” The emergency rooms will be filled to capacity with confused, desperate, sick people, and new illegal alien arrivals.

Listen to Dr. Paugh on Butler on Business (WAFS 1190), every Wednesday at 10:49 AM EST

Dr. Ileana Johnson Paugh, (Romanian Conservative) is a freelance writer (Canada Free Press, Romanian Conservative, usactionnews.com), author, radio commentator (Silvio Canto Jr. Blogtalk Radio, Butler on Business WAFS 1190, and Republic Broadcasting Network), and speaker. Her book, “Echoes of Communism, is available at Amazon in paperback and Kindle. Short essays describe health care, education, poverty, religion, social engineering, and confiscation of property. A second book, “Liberty on Life Support,” is also available at Amazon in paperback and Kindle. A third book, “U.N. Agenda 21: Environmental Piracy,” is a best seller at Amazon.com under Globalism, Politics, and Environmental Policy.

Her commentaries reflect American Exceptionalism, the economy, immigration, and education.Visit

There are less than two days to go before states have to decide whether they will go it alone or partner with the White House to set up Obamacare health insurance exchanges.

Half of the states have already decided to let the federal government build the new online insurance marketplace for them, while a handful will work with the Department of Health and Human Services and handle limited parts of the exchanges, according to Politico.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican, announced on Wednesday that he would be pushing more people into a federally run exchange.
Fewer than 20 state governments, most of them led by Democrats, have decided to establish their own exchanges.
Many of the Affordable Health Care Act’s most vocal critics are still vacillating, says the organization. Among them are Republican Govs. Chris Christie of New Jersey, who vetoed Democratic legislation to create an exchange, Florida’s Rick Scott, who led the legal battle in front of the Supreme Court, Virginia’s Bob McDonnell, and Utah’s Gary Herbert.
“Some people don’t like the idea of a partnership because the concern they have is one partner is superior to the other,” Herbert told Politico.
McDonnell said this week that he would take part in a federally facilitated exchange but retain state authority over its management.
“At the end of the day,” said Joel Ario of Manatt Health Solutions, Obama’s first exchange chief, “ I think the states want the markets to work. There has to be cooperation between the state and federal government, and that could be accomplished in a federal exchange.”
Either way, Friday’s deadline is fast approaching. Enrollment is set to begin on Oct 1, and coverage will kick in on Jan. 1, 2014.

I assume you've gotten the news.
Like the Iraq War and the multi-trillion dollar Wall Street bailout, Obamacare was sold with an ocean of bullshit.
When will the looting of America be stopped?
The gruesome details:
The central parts of ObamaCare don’t roll out until 2014, but the wheels are already falling off this clunker. The latest news from four federal agencies is that 1) insurance will be a lot less affordable than Americans were led to expect, 2) fewer people than promised will get insurance and 3) millions of people who have coverage through a job now will lose it, thanks to the president’s “reforms.” Oh, and children are the biggest victims.
The Affordable Care Act is looking less and less affordable.
Start with the IRS’s new estimate for what the cheapest family plan will cost by 2016: $20,000 a year to cover two adults and three kids. And that will only cover 60 percent of medical bills, so add hefty out-of-pocket costs, too.
The next surprise is for parents who thought their kids would be covered by an employer. Sloppy wording in the law left that unclear until last week, when the IRS ruled that kids won’t be covered.
Starting in 2014, the law will require employers with 50 or more full-time employees to offer coverage or pay a penalty. “Affordable” coverage, that is — meaning the employee can’t be told to contribute more than 9.5 percent of his salary. For example, a worker earning $40,000 a year cannot be required to pay more than $3.800.
But the law doesn’t specifically mandate family coverage — and now the administration says that won’t be required.
You can see why: If the lowest-cost family plan (again, two adults and three kids) is to run a whopping $20,000, and if the employee’s contribution is limited to $3,800, the employer’s tab would be $16,200 — adding about $7.40 an hour to the cost of that employee. Wisely, the IRS announced on Jan. 30 that employers won’t have to pay for dependents.
But the Congressional Budget Office’s much-cited prediction that ObamaCare would leave only 30 million people uninsured by 2016 was based on the assumption that kids would be covered by employers. At the very least, employers insuring their workers for the first time to avoid the penalty are unlikely to do that.
So how will the kids be covered? They won’t. The IRS shocked the law’s advocates by announcing that the insurance exchanges won’t provide subsidies for a child whose parent is covered at work.
Nor will these parents be penalized for not insuring their children — the IRS will kindly consider the kids exempt from the mandate.
Also exempt are millions of people who’ll stay uninsured because their state is wisely choosing not to loosen Medicaid eligibility.
Some background: Despite President Obama’s promises to help solve the problem of the uninsured by making private health plans more affordable, the law expands coverage mainly by forcing states to loosen their Medicaid eligibility rules. But the Supreme Court ruled that the feds can’t command states in this way.
At first, the CBO said that ruling would only prevent 4 million people from gaining coverage — but more states than it expected are refusing to go along; it could well be 8 million more without coverage.
Oh, and the CBO last week also doubled its previous estimate on how many people will lose the health coverage they now get through work, upping the figure to 8 million by 2016 and 12 million by 2019. Several top consulting firms put the figures even higher.
Yet the biggest setback is that most states are refusing to set up insurance exchanges. The exchanges are supposed to sell the government-mandated plans and hand out taxpayer-funded subsidies to most enrollees.
Here’s the glitch. The law says that in states that refuse, the federal government can set up an exchange. But the law empowers only state exchanges, not federal ones, to hand out subsidies. The Obama administration says it will disregard the law and offer subsidies in all 50 states anyway, but the case will likely go to the Supreme Court.
If the courts uphold the clear language of the law, then some 8 million people in the affected states won’t be eligible for subsidies to cover that $20,000 (or more) insurance bill. That’s another 8 million without coverage.
All in all, at least 40 million people could be uninsured in 2016, only 9 million fewer than before the law was passed.
Expect the momentum for repealing this law to grow as its flaws, perverse incentives and faulty predictions come to light.

It was one of the biggest applause lines in President Obama’s State of the Union address, drawing cheers from both sides of the aisle. “We’ll work to strengthen families by removing the financial deterrents to marriage for low-income couples,” Obama said. “What makes you a man isn’t the ability to conceive a child; it’s having the courage to raise one. And we want to encourage that. We want to help that.”

Wonderful sentiment, but Obama’s signature legislative achievement creates such a powerful “financial deterrent” to marriage that even one former Obama administration official warns that ObamaCarewill increase the divorce rate among lower-income families.
Like most government benefit programs, Obamacare is rife with perverse “affordability” based on the cost of individual coverage, regardless of whether family coverage is affordable.
This was explained by former Obama Treasury Department official David Gamage in The Wall Street Journal last year. “Consider a couple with children in which one of the parents earns most of the family’s income. If the couple marries, the family would lose thousands of dollars of subsidies that could otherwise be used to pay for health insurance for the children and the lower-income spouse,” Gamage said. “If the couple is already married, divorce may be their only option for obtaining affordable insurance for their children and the lower-income parent.”
The phase-out schedule for subsidies creates an additional disincentive to marriage. As economist Diana Furchtgott-Roth of the Manhattan Institute explained in testimony to a congressional hearing: “Health insurance premium credits in the new law are linked not directly to income, but to the poverty line, resulting in a particularly steep marriage penalty for low-income Americans. With $10,890 as the poverty line for one person and an additional $3,820 for a spouse, marriage means less government help with health insurance.”
By accelerating family break-up, Obamacare will also worsen health outcomes. Research has consistently shownthat married people have better health, longer lives, and better survival rates for some diseases. Children of intact marriages also have lower infant mortality and better physical and mental health outcomes. There is also a well-documented connection between marital status and child poverty.
It might sound good for Obama to extol the virtues of marriage and family, but what does it accomplish if his signature policy pushes strongly in the opposite direction? If we’re serious about encouraging marriage, repealing or delaying Obamacare should be an urgent priority.Phil Kerpen is president of American Commitment.

The horse meat fiasco in Europe has prodded scientists to look a bit deeper into what else we might be consuming. A team of South African scientists have just found traces of human tissue in meat meant for public consumption from 9 provinces.
The issue was revealed to parliament, almost as a side note, during meat inspection briefings on Tuesday.
A University of Stellenbosch scientist and his team conducted a microbial analysis that revealed traces of human elements, but said that slaughterhouse workers sometimes cut themselves . . . or other things . . . which could lead to the findings.

If I walked into a factory and the sample I randomly selected to test was a meat sample of which the person de-boning the meat had just picked his nose and then touched the meat, I would get a totally different microbial reading," he said

Delicious. Beyond the findings themselves, it brings up the global hot-button topic of the moment: food labeling. How much should we know about what we are consuming?

In addition to the troubling statements above, scientist Louw Hoffman noted that only 15% of the meat being sold in South Africa is correctly labeled, revealing other potentially harmful attributes of which consumers are currently unaware:

"In the labelling regulations it clearly states that allergens have to be mentioned and noted," said Hoffman.

Allergens like . . . other people's genetic signature?
Yet, Hoffman and his team of scientists concluded that the incorrect labeling poses "no threat" to the consumers who eat it, despite some more gems uncovered:

Meat Musical Chairs

Briefing parliament's portfolio committee on agriculture, forestry and fisheries, University of Western Cape forensic scientist Dr Eugenia D'Amato said nearly 43% of samples she had tested which were labelled as game, were, in fact, beef.

D'Amato said horse meat had also been used as a substitute for springbok in biltong, and pork was found in ostrich sausages.

There was also a smaller proportion of kangaroo in samples.

Despite the overall findings that consumers have absolutely no idea what they are eating - including human remnants - in 85% of the products, SA's Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries deputy director-general downplayed it by asserting that we are not becoming unwitting cannibals:

It is possible that (if tested) we could find traces of human DNA in meat. However, even if we do find human DNA, it does not mean we are eating human flesh.

Great. Unfortunately, we are evidently eliminating healthy microorganisms in the processing of

foods, but since there is an acceptable standard of nasty foreign entities, thanks to our regulatory agencies - we have introduced a variety of contaminants into now weakened guts and immune systems.

We'd like to think that these food scandals are safe from us - overseas, it's their problem. But, big problems are usually systemic and many of the developed nations are on the same platform. As with most food scandals, they go on for years unnoticed before the beans are spilled.
It doesn't sound like anyone's literally being run through the meat grinder just yet, but it's a startling fact that we don't know much about what our food comes into contact with. And we have scientists and regulatory agencies continually asserting how safe our food supply is.
Are you unsettled at the prospect of ingesting someone else's particles and blood? Do you wonder what else will be found when the ext scientific investigation is conducted in your country?
Perhaps we should be asking ourselves before each meal, "Hey, who's in there? How'd they get in there? Anyone missing?"Sources:

(NaturalNews) Microwaves absolutely decimate the nutritional value of your food, destroying the very vitamins and phytonutrients that prevent disease and support good health. Previous studies have shown that as much as 98% of the cancer-fighting nutrients in broccoli, for example, are destroyed by microwaving.

To understand why, you have to understand the nature of vitamins and phytonutrients (plant-based nutrients). These are very delicate molecules which are fragile. They are easily destroyed by heat, which is why raw plant foods contain more plant nutrients than cooked foods. Carotenoids, antioxidants and other molecules like DIM (in broccoli) or anthocyanins (in purple corn) are all easily destroyed by microwave energy.

Microwaves "nuke" your food at a cellular levelMicrowaving is the worst way to cook foods because microwaves excite the water molecules inside whatever you're cooking, causing heat to be formed from the inside out. This results in a cell-by-cell "nuking" of the food (such as broccoli, carrots, etc.), causing the near-total molecular decomposition of the vitamins and phytonutrients that promote disease.

Microwaved food is not merely "dead" food at every level, it is food that has been molecularly deconstructed, leaving nothing but empty calories, fiber and minerals. Virtually the entire vitamin and phytonutrient content has been destroyed.

(NaturalNews) Our Brains are under siege from all angles. From the dumbing down of the education system, toxins and hormones in food and water, the covert reduction of people's attention spans and information saturation, to endless stimulant induced peaks and troughs - times are hard for your grey matter. Over stimulated, under nourished minds can lead to stress, mental problems and a lower overall quality of life. Thankfully, there are some easy ways to nourish your nous, feed your thoughts and realign your mind.

All major organs are vital for the successful functioning of your organism, but few would disagree that the processing center is the most important, yet most are completely unaware of how the brain works and ignorant of ways to protect the brain and help it function more efficiently. These steps will help you regain control.

receptors in the brain normally stimulated by the neurotransmitter "adenosine," which keeps dopamine and glutamate, the brains "happy" compounds in check. Caffeine stops adenosine from regulating these neurotransmitters, giving you extra concentration and an energetic high. The problem? You are actually in a drug induced state, with a harsh come-down that stops your natural ability to concentrate. Furthermore, after the high is over, adenosine is still blocked and you need more and more caffeine to get a rapidly diminishing buff. Expect 10 days of hell to filter

caffeine from your system, after which concentration will improve and your thoughts will become clearer. The same goes for cigarettes.

Flood yourself with oxygen

The brain "eats" oxygen to function and that oxygen is supplied through the blood. This means there are two easy ways to instantly increase the brain's ability to process information, and concentrate better.

1) Exercise instantly increases blood flow, directly increasing oxygen in the brain. The body will also release endorphins, another "happy" neurotransmitter - meaning you get healthier, feel good and your brain will continue to function better for around 24 hours, just about until your next exercise session.

2) Eating foods and food supplements that increase circulation can directly boost concentration and focus. Think the three "Gs", Ginseng, Ginger and Ginkgo Biloba. Unlike caffeine, they stimulate via boosting blood flow to the brain - adding more oxygen and making the brain literally work harder, faster and more efficiently. This boost is 100 percent natural and won't lead to negative side effects.

Nature's nutrient for neurons

You can actually support the fundamental structure of the brain as well, not just its functioning. Hericium Erinaceus, commonly known as the Lion's Mane Mushroom, increases NGF (Nerve Growth Factor) in the body. NGF plays an essential role in stimulating new growth of nerves in the body and neurons (the bits the electrical signals zoom between) in the brain. More NGF, fewer brain cells die, new ones can be created and last longer. Low levels of NGF have been linked to the early stages of Alzheimer's disease and dementia, so supporting your brain's physical structure by increasing NGF can be a great insurance policy.
The information you introduce your mind to is also important; reading quality magazine articles, books, playing chess or sudoku help to lengthen attention spans and improve focus and cognitive function. Swap soundbite culture, fast paced "instant reward" computer games and small snippets of information for depth and breadth, add in some meditation or other deep relaxation and you too can reclaim your brain.Sources for this article include:http://www.chemistryexplained.com/Bo-Ce/Caffeine.htmlhttp://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18844328http://www.cornermark.com/ginseng/ginseng_research_benefits.html

There's no shortage of health myths out there, but I believe the truth is slowly but surely starting to seep out there and get a larger audience. For example, two recent articles actually hit the nail right on the head in terms of good nutrition advice.

Shape Magazine features a slide show on "9 ingredients nutritionists won’t touch," and authoritynutrition.com listed “11 of the biggest lies of mainstream nutrition."

These health topics are all essential to get "right" if you want to protect your health, and the health of your loved ones, which is why I was delighted to see both of these sources disseminating spot-on advice. I highly recommend reading through both of them.

Here, I will review my own top 10 lies and misconceptions of mainstream nutrition—some of which are included in the two featured sources, plus a few additional ones I believe are important.

Lie # 1: 'Saturated Fat Causes Heart Disease'

As recently as 2002, the "expert" Food & Nutrition Board issued the following misguided statement, which epitomizes this myth:

"Saturated fats and dietary cholesterol have no known beneficial role in preventing chronic disease and are not required at any level in the diet."

Similarly, the National Academies’ Institute of Medicine recommends adults to get 45–65 percent of their calories from carbohydrates, 20-35 percent from fat, and 10-35 percent from protein. This is an inverse ideal fat to carb ratio that is virtually guaranteed to lead you astray, and result in a heightened risk of chronic disease.

Most people benefit from 50-70 percent healthful fats in their diet for optimal health, whereas you need very few, if any, carbohydrates to maintain good health... Although that may seem like a lot, fat is much denser and consumes a much smaller portion of your meal plate.

This dangerous recommendation, which arose from an unproven hypothesis from the mid-1950s, has been harming your health and that of your loved ones for about 40 years now.

The truth is, saturated fats from animal and vegetable sources provide the building blocks for cell membranes and a variety of hormones and hormone-like substances, without which your body cannot function optimally. They also act as carriers for important fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E and K. Dietary fats are also needed for the conversion of carotene to vitamin A, for mineral absorption, and for a host of other biological processes.

In fact, saturated is the preferred fuel for your heart! For more information about saturated fats and the essential role they play in maintaining your health, please read my previous article The Truth About Saturated Fat.

Lie # 2: 'Eating Fat Makes You Gain Weight'

The low-fat myth may have done more harm to the health of millions than any other dietary recommendation as the resulting low-fat craze led to increased consumption of trans-fats, which we now know increases your risk of obesity, diabetes and heart disease—the very health problems wrongfully attributed to saturated fats...

To end the confusion, it's very important to realize that eating fat will not make you fat!

The primary cause of excess weight and all the chronic diseases associated with it, is actually the consumption of too much sugar -- especially fructose, but also all sorts of grains, which rapidly convert to sugar in your body. If only the low-fat craze had been a low-sugar craze... then we wouldn't have nearly as much chronic disease as we have today. For an explanation of why and how a low-fat diet can create the very health problems it's claimed to prevent, please see this previous article.

Most people use artificial sweeteners to lose weight and/or because they’re diabetic and need to avoid sugar. The amazing irony is that nearly all the studies that have carefully analyzed their effectiveness show that those who use artificial sweeteners actually gain more weight than those who consume caloric sweeteners. Studies have also revealed that artificial sweeteners can be worse than sugar for diabetics.

In 2005, data gathered from the 25-year long San Antonio Heart Study showed that drinking dietsoft drinks increased the likelihood of serious weight gain, far more so than regular soda.3 On average, each diet soft drink the participants consumed per day increased their risk of becoming overweight by 65 percent within the next seven to eight years, and made them 41 percent more likely to become obese. There are several potential causes for this, including:

Artificial sweeteners appear to simply perpetuate a craving for sweets, and overall sugar consumption is therefore not reduced—leading to further problems controlling your weight.

Artificial sweeteners may disrupt your body's natural ability to "count calories," as evidenced in studies such as this 2004 study at Purdue University,5 which found that rats fed artificially sweetened liquids ate more high-calorie food than rats fed high-caloric sweetened liquids.

There is also a large number of health dangers associated with artificial sweeteners and aspartame in particular. I've compiled an ever-growing list of studies pertaining to health problems associated with aspartame, which you can findhere. If you're still on the fence, I highly recommend reviewing these studies for yourself so that you can make an educated decision. For more information on aspartame, the worst artificial sweetener, please see my aspartame video.

Of the many health-harming ingredients listed in the featured article by Shape Magazine—all of which you're bound to get in excess if you consume processed foods—fructose is perhaps the greatest threat to your health. Mounting evidence testifies to the fact that excess fructose, primarily in the form of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), is a primary factor causing not just obesity, but also chronic and lethal disease. In fact, I am convinced that fructose is one of the leading causes of a great deal of needless suffering from poor health and premature death.

Many conventional health "experts," contend that sugar and fructose in moderation is perfectly okay and part of a normal "healthy" diet, and the corn industry vehemently denies any evidence showing that fructose is metabolically more harmful than regular sugar (sucrose). This widespread denial and sweeping the evidence under the carpet poses a massive threat to your health, unless you do your own research.

As a standard recommendation, I advise keeping your total fructose consumption below 25 grams per day. For most people it would also be wise to limit your fructose from fruit to 15 grams or less. Unfortunately, while this is theoretically possible, precious few people are actually doing that.

Cutting out a few desserts will not make a big difference if you're still eating a "standard American diet"—in fact, I've previously written about how various foods and beverages contain far more sugar than a glazed doughnut. Because of the prevalence of HFCS in foods and beverages, the average person now consumes 1/3 of a pound of sugar EVERY DAY, which is five ounces or 150 grams, half of which is fructose.

That's 300 percent more than the amount that will trigger biochemical havoc. Remember that is the AVERAGE; many actually consume more than twice that amount. For more details about the health dangers of fructose and my recommendations, please see my recent article Confirmed—Fructose Can Increase Your Hunger and Lead to Overeating.

Lie # 5: 'Soy is a Health Food'

The meteoric rise of soy as a "health food" is a perfect example of how a brilliant marketing strategy can fool millions. But make no mistake about it, unfermented soy products are NOT healthful additions to your diet, and can be equally troublesome for men and women of all ages. If you find this recommendation startling then I would encourage you to review some of the many articles listed on my Soy Index Page.

Not only that, but more than 90 percent of American soy crops are genetically modified, which carries its own set of health risks. I am not opposed to all soy, however. Organic and, most importantly, properly fermented soy does have great health benefits. Examples of such healthful fermented soy products include tempeh, miso and natto. Here is a small sampling of the detrimental health effects linked to unfermented soy consumption:

Breast cancer

Brain damage

Infant abnormalities

Thyroid disorders

Kidney stones

Immune system impairment

Severe, potentially fatal food allergies

Impaired fertility

Danger during pregnancy and breastfeeding

Lie # 6: 'Eggs are a Source of Unhealthy Cholesterol'Eggs are probably one of the most demonized foods in the United States, mainly because of the misguided idea implied by the lipid hypothesis that eating egg yolk increases the cholesterol levels in your body. You can forget about such concerns, because contrary to popular belief, eggs are one of the healthiest foods you can eat and they do not have a detrimental impact on cholesterol levels. Numerous nutritional studies have dispelled the myth that you should avoid eating eggs, so this recommendation is really hanging on by a very bare thread...

One such study, conducted by the Yale Prevention Research Center and published in 2010, showed that egg consumption did not have a negative effect on endothelial function – a measure of cardiac risk – and did not cause a spike on cholesterol levels. The participants of the Yale study ate two eggs per day for a period of six weeks. There are many benefits associated with eggs, including:

Choose range organic eggs, and avoid “omega-3 eggs” as this is not the proper way to optimize your omega-3 levels. To produce these omega-3 eggs, the hens are usually fed poor-quality sources of omega-3 fats that are already oxidized. Omega-3 eggs are more perishable than non-omega-3 eggs.

Lie # 7: 'Whole Grains are Good for Everyone'

The use of whole-grains is an easy subject to get confused on especially for those who have a passion for nutrition, as for the longest time we were told the fiber in whole grains is highly beneficial. Unfortunately ALL grains, including whole-grain and organic varieties, can elevate your insulin levels, which can increase your risk of disease. They also contain gluten, which many are sensitive to, if not outright allergic. It has been my experience that more than 85 percent of Americans have trouble controlling their insulin levels -- especially those who have the following conditions:

Overweight

Diabetes

High blood pressure

High cholesterol

Protein metabolic types

In addition, sub-clinical gluten intolerance is far more common than you might think, which can also wreak havoc with your health. As a general rule, I strongly recommend eliminating or at least restricting grains as well as sugars/fructose from your diet, especially if you have any of the above conditions that are related to insulin resistance. The higher your insulin levels and the more prominent your signs of insulin overload are, the more ambitious your grain elimination needs to be.

If you are one of the fortunate ones without insulin resistance and of normal body weight, then grains are fine, especially whole grains—as long as you don’t have any issues with gluten and select organic and unrefined forms. It is wise to continue to monitor your grain consumption and your health as life is dynamic and constantly changing. What might be fine when you are 25 or 30 could become a major problem at 40 when your growth hormone and level of exercise is different.

Lie # 8: 'Milk Does Your Body Good'

Unfortunately, the myth that conventional pasteurized milk has health benefits is a persistent one, even though it’s far from true. Conventional health agencies also refuse to address the real dangers of the growth hormones and antibiotics found in conventional milk. I do not recommend drinking pasteurized milk of any kind, including organic, because once milk has been pasteurized its physical structure is changed in a way that can actually cause allergies and immune problems.

Important enzymes like lactase are destroyed during the pasteurization process, which causes many people to not be able to digest milk. Additionally, vitamins (such as A, C, B6 and B12) are diminished and fragile milk proteins are radically transformed from health nurturing to unnatural amino acid configurations that can actually worsen your health. The eradication of beneficial bacteria through the pasteurization process also ends up promoting pathogens rather than protecting you from them.

The healthy alternative to pasteurized milk is raw milk, which is an outstanding source of nutrients including beneficial bacteria such as lactobacillus acidophilus, vitamins and enzymes, and it is, in my estimation, one of the finest sources of calcium available. For more details please watch the interview I did with Mark McAfee, who is the owner of Organic Pastures, the largest organic dairy in the US.

However, again, if you have insulin issues and are struggling with weight issues, high blood pressure, diabetes, cancer or high cholesterol it would be best to restrict your dairy to organic butter as the carbohydrate content, lactose, could be contribute to insulin and leptin resistance. Fermented organic raw dairy would eliminate the lactose issue and would be better tolerated. But if you are sensitive to dairy it might be best to avoid these too.

Make no mistake about it; genetically engineered (GE) foods may be one of the absolute most dangerous aspects of our food supply today. I strongly recommend avoiding ALL GE foods. Since over 90 percent of all corn grown in the US is GE corn, and over 95 percent all soy is GE soy, this means that virtually every processed food you encounter at your local supermarket that does not bear the "USDA Organic" label likely contains one or more GE components. To avoid GE foods, first memorize the following list of well-known and oft-used GE crops:

Fresh zucchini, crookneck squash and Hawaiian papaya are also commonly GE. It’s important to realize that unless you're buying all organic food, or grow your own veggies and raise your own livestock, or at the very least buy all whole foods (even if conventionally grown) and cook everything from scratch, chances are you're consuming GE foods every single day... What ultimate impact these foods will have on your health is still unknown, but increased disease, infertility and birth defects appear to be on the top of the list of most likely side effects. The first-ever lifetime feeding study also showed a dramatic increase in organ damage, cancer, and reduced lifespan.

Lie # 10: 'Lunch Meats Make for a Healthy Nutritious Meal'

Lastly, processed meats, which includes everything from hot dogs, deli meats, bacon, and pepperoni are rarely thought of as strict no-no’s, but they really should be, if you’re concerned about your health. Virtually all processed meat products contain dangerous compounds that put them squarely on the list of foods to avoid or eliminate entirely. These compounds include:

Sodium nitrite: a commonly used preservative and antimicrobial agent that also adds color and flavor to processed and cured meats.

Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs): Many processed meats are smoked as part of the curing process, which causes PAHs to form.

Advanced Glycation End Products (AGEs): When food is cooked at high temperatures—including when it is pasteurized or sterilized—it increases the formation of AGEs in your food. AGEs build up in your body over time leading to oxidative stress, inflammation and an increased risk of heart disease, diabetes and kidney disease.

This recommendation is backed up by a report commissioned by The World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF). The review, which evaluated the findings of more than 7,000 clinical studies, was funded by money raised from the general public, so the findings were not influenced by vested interests. It's also the biggest review of the evidence ever undertaken, and it confirms previous findings: Processed meats increase your risk of cancer, especially bowel cancer, and NO amount of processed meat is "safe." A previous analysis by the WCRF found that eating just one sausage a day raises your risk of developing bowel cancer by 20 percent, and other studies have found that processed meats increase your risk of:

Colon cancer by 50 percent

Bladder cancer by 59 percent

Stomach cancer by 38 percent

Pancreatic cancer by 67 percent

Processed meats may also increase your risk of diabetes by 50 percent, and lower your lung function and increase your risk of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). If you absolutely want or need a hot dog or other processed meats once in awhile, you can reduce your risk by:

Looking for "uncured" varieties that contain NO nitrates

Choosing varieties that say 100% beef, 100% chicken, etc. This is the only way to know that the meat is from a single species and does not include byproducts (like chicken skin or chicken fat or other parts)

Ideally, purchase sausages and other processed meats from a small, local farmer who can tell you exactly what's in their products. These are just some of the health myths and misconceptions out there. There are certainly many more. The ones listed above are some of the most important ones, in my view, simply because they’re so widely misunderstood. They’re also critical to get "right" if you want to protect your health, and the health of your loved ones. For more great advise, please review the two featured sources.

(NaturalNews) Unless you eat organic foods and prepare them at home, you've probably purchased packaged, processed meats at some time. Non-organic versions contain added preservatives, chemicals and GMOs; and, many harbor bacterial toxins that harm the body. Even their organic counterparts may be similarly contaminated during processing. Most processed meats are treated to stop the growth of molds and to prevent spoilage. Those that have not been chemically treated, such as organic meats, are still potential breeding grounds for unwelcome micro-organisms.

Salmonella bacteria is common in processed meats. Organic meats are no exception. Consuming salmonella-contaminated foods can produce illness in the form of fever, vomiting, chills and severe diarrhea -- leading to dehydration and death in sensitive individuals. The primary form of transmission is through contaminated hands spreading bacteria during packaging. Washing hands thoroughly and sterilizing cooking surfaces and utensils help prevent contamination. Onset of salmonella poisoning is generally experienced 12 to 36 hours after consumption of contaminated meats.

Campylobacter jejuni or C. jejuni is another dangerous bacteria found primarily in chicken, raw

ground meat, and raw shellfish. Although C. jejuni are easily destroyed with the application of heat during processing, the bacteria can still be passed to humans through cross-contamination. Symptoms of infection appear several days after ingestion of foods. C. jejuni is often experienced as a neurotoxin and complications such as meningitis, Guillain-Barre syndrome, arthritic pains, urinary tract infections and colitis may occur.Staphylococcus bacteria are commonly found in dormant colonies in the nose, the throat, and on the skin as acne, infected sores, boils, or wounds. Staphylococcus is common, and in some cases can be highly destructive to human tissue. The bacteria are heat resistant and produce a toxin that forms on warm foods left uncovered in open air. When processed meats are handled and left uncovered, they encourage the growth of staphylococcus. Initial symptoms of staphylococci contamination include vomiting, diarrhea, cramping and extreme exhaustion. Additional symptoms that may later include boils, infected skin lesions, and MRSA.Clostridium perfringens belongs in the same genus as is the botulinum bacteria. Although C. perfringens causes less severe symptoms than botulisim, it remains a dangerous toxin found in processed meats. Foods that have not been properly cooled or covered are prone to contamination. Symptoms appear as painful cramping and diarrhea that disappear in several days.Chemical toxins

Nitrates and nitrites.

Potassium nitrate and sodium nitrite are used as preservatives in processed meats and are known toxins to humans, according to the American Meat Institute. Symptoms include vomiting, headaches, breathing difficulties, allergies and death. Additionally, the presence of nitrates and nitrites in processed meats has been linked to cancer.Sulfites, or sulfur dioxide is used as a fungicide and preservative to prevent spoilage. Sulfur dioxide bleaches rotten sections of meat, hiding it from view and destroying vitamins.

Artificial sweeteners. Many processed meats are sweetened artificially with aspartame, saccharin and other chemicals. These have been linked to various allergies, headaches, behavioral disorders and neurological problems. Additionally, saccharin is linked to cancer.

The Coca-Cola Company Beverage Institute for Health & Wellness (an oxymoron if I’ve ever heard one), has released an “aspartame safety” page that is described as a “resource for professionals.”The only problem is that it claims aspartameis safe for use by nearly all populations, except for those born with the genetic disorder phenylketonuria (PKU). In reality, research suggests this artificial sweetener may be implicated in health risks ranging from cancer to seizures and even death.

Coca-Cola’s Misleading Aspartame Information

Aspartame is used in more than 6,000 products worldwide, including Diet Coke products, which may contain up to 190 milligrams (mg) of aspartame per 8.3 fluid ounce serving.

Coca-Cola notes that “when aspartame is digested, the body breaks it down into aspartic acid, phenylalanine and methanol” – and it is methanol that is one of the root problems with aspartame.
However, Coca-Cola (and many other food and beverage manufacturers) often misleadingly counter the claims of methanol being a harmful aspect of aspartame by pointing out that it also occurs naturally in fruits and vegetables. For instance, Coca-Cola writes:

“Compared to amounts obtained from an aspartame-sweetened beverage, these components are consumed in much greater amounts from a variety of foods, including milk, meat, dried beans, fruits and vegetables... a serving of tomato juice provides about six times more methanol, compared to an equivalent serving of a beverage sweetened with aspartame.”

So why would methanol cause a problem in aspartame?

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Methanol in Fruits and Veggies Differs From Methanol in Aspartame...

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Aspartame is primarily made up of aspartic acid and phenylalanine. The phenylalanine has been synthetically modified to carry a methyl group, which provides the majority of the sweetness.
That phenylalanine methyl bond, called a methyl ester, is very weak, which allows the methyl group on the phenylalanine to easily break off and form methanol. This is in sharp contrast to naturally occurring methanol found in certain fruits and vegetables, where it is firmly bonded to pectin, allowing the methanol to be safely passed through your digestive tract.
(However, the methyl alcohol can be liberated by putrefying bacteria that spoil fruits and vegetables and in fact methanol is an indication of spoilage in fruits and vegetables.
Dr. Monte recommends cutting off all spoiled parts before eating your fruits and veggies. I believe most people avoid eating spoiled produce. If not, it would be a wise move. It's the putrefaction that liberates the methyl alcohol.)
Methanol acts as a Trojan horse; it's carried into susceptible tissues in your body, like your brain and bone marrow, where the alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH) enzyme converts it into formaldehyde, which wreaks havoc with sensitive proteins and DNA.
All other animals have a protective mechanism that allows methanol to be broken down into harmless formic acid, but according to aspartame expert Dr. Woodrow Monte, there's a major biochemical problem with methanol in humans, because of the difference in how it's metabolized compared to in all other animals. This is why toxicology testing on animals is a flawed model. It doesn't fully apply to humans.

Aspartame Poses Major Biochemical Problems in Human

Coca-Cola also misleadingly challenges the link between aspartame and headaches, stating:

“Most studies investigating a relationship between aspartame and headaches show no effect. However, results from some small studies have shown a positive connection between aspartame intake and headaches, suggesting a susceptible population subset, although there is no biological explanation. Inconsistent findings may be caused by lack of objective measurements for headache onset or duration.”

This simply isn't true. There is, in fact, an obvious biological explanation according to Dr. Monte:

"'Here is the story: there is a major biochemical problem here,' he says. 'Methyl alcohol is known now, and has been known since 1940, to be metabolized differently by humans from every other animal.'"

Both animals and humans have small structures called peroxisomes in each cell. There are a couple of hundred in every cell of your body, which are designed to detoxify a variety of chemicals. Peroxisome contains catalase, which help detoxify methanol. Other chemicals in the peroxisome convert the formaldehyde to formic acid, which is harmless, but this last step occurs only in animals.
When methanol enters the peroxisome of every animal except humans, it gets into that mechanism. Humans do have the same number of peroxisomes in comparable cells as animals, but human peroxisomes cannot convert the toxic formaldehyde into harmless formic acid.
So to recap: In humans, the methyl alcohol travels through your blood vessels into sensitive areas, such as your brain, that are loaded with ADH, which converts methanol to formaldehyde. And since there's no catalase present, the formaldehyde is free to cause enormous damage in your tissues.
Symptoms from methanol poisoning are many, and include headaches, ear buzzing, dizziness, nausea, gastrointestinal disturbances, weakness, vertigo, chills, memory lapses, numbness and shooting pains in the extremities, behavioral disturbances, and neuritis. The most well known problems from methanol poisoning are vision problems including misty vision, progressive contraction of visual fields, blurring of vision, obscuration of vision, retinal damage, and blindness. Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen that causes retinal damage, interferes with DNA replication and may cause birth defects.

Aspartame May Be More Toxic in Men than Women

In one recent study, the health statistics for nearly 48,000 men and over 77,000 women over the age of 20 were reviewed, in which they found that men who consumed more than one diet soda per day had an increased risk of developing multiple myeloma and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. This was the longest-ever human aspartame study, spanning 22 years. Interestingly enough, this association was not found in women. Leukemia was associated with diet soda intake in both sexes.

I first found out about this study when ABC News contacted me and requested that I provide them with a comprehensive analysis of this 40-page study within an hour. Fortunately, I have extensively reviewed this topic and was able to provide their requested review.
One hypothesis for the difference between the sexes is that men have a higher activity of the enzyme ADH (explained above), which metabolizes methanol and converts it to formaldehyde. More formaldehyde circulating in your blood would naturally have more opportunity to cause greater damage.
Although the authors' summary conclusion mentions they do not rule out the possibility of chance for this association, it's worth noting that this is because they could not offer a conclusive explanation for the difference between the sexes. I carefully reviewed this study in its entirety, and found it to be extremely well executed. While the mechanism responsible for the difference between the sexes for certain cancers need to be studied further, Dr. Monty’s research demonstrates a perfectly viable mechanism of harm, including cancer.
The long-term nature of this study is really crucial because one of the primary tricks companies use to hide the toxicity of their products is short-term tests. The longest study prior to this one was only 4.5 months, far too short to reveal any toxicity from chronic exposure. Unfortunately, because there are so many of these short-term trials, manufacturers get away with saying that aspartame is one of the most studied food additives ever made and no health concerns have ever been discovered. As Coca-Cola put it on their page:

"Aspartame is one of the most thoroughly studied food ingredients, with more than 200 scientific studies confirming its safety."

Researchers Downplayed Aspartame’s Toxic Effects...

Unfortunately, even though Harvard University researchers originally put out a press release alerting of these potential cancer dangers, they soon caved to pressure from industry and issued a second press release that minimized the impact of the study. Even the study’s authors offered only a milquetoast conclusion:

"Although our findings preserve the possibility of a detrimental effect of a constituent of diet soda, such as aspartame, on select cancers, the inconsistent sex effects... do not permit the ruling out of chance as an explanation."

One hypothesis for the difference between the sexes is that men have a higher activity of the enzyme ADH, as I mentioned earlier, which metabolizes methanol and converts it to formaldehyde. More formaldehyde circulating in your blood would naturally have more opportunity to cause greater damage. It's possible that there is some hormonally mediated protection against the adverse effects of aspartame in women, in addition to men having higher ADH activity, but the study was not designed to answer that question. All in all however, I believe the study offers significant supporting evidence of the danger that aspartame-sweetened and other "diet" drinks and foods pose.

Alcohol with Diet Soda Accelerates Intoxication

In a related study, researchers found that mixing alcohol with diet soda, compared to regular soda, gets you drunk faster. The study compared Smirnoff Red Label with Squirt (a lemon-lime soda) against the same vodka mixed with Diet Squirt. The diet drink increased breath-alcohol content (BAC) by 18 percent — the near-equivalent of one additional standard drink, and enough to push you over the legal limit for driving. As reported by Counsel & Heal:

“While diet drinks save calorie intake, they actually accelerate the intoxication. The reason is that since diet drinks have less sugar in them, they get digested faster in the intestine and the alcohol in the drink gets mixed in the blood faster. So it is always a good idea to have alcohol with regular soft drinks, as alcohol with diet soft drinks accelerates the intoxication process.”

A Historical Timeline of Aspartame

Aspartame is the number one source of side-effect complaints to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), with over 10,000 complaints filed and over 91 symptoms documented that are related to its consumption. With that many reports of adverse effects, it's hard to believe aspartame is still allowed on the market. Unfortunately, aspartame's approval was and still is largely a political affair. Many readers have long forgotten what the 60-Minutes' correspondent Mike Wallace stated in his 1996 report on aspartame – available to view in this 2009 article – that the approval of aspartame was "the most contested in FDA history."

Food Industry Undermines Health Policy, Study Finds

According to a recent international analysis of the involvement by “unhealthy commodity" companies in health policy-making, researchers warn that self-regulation was failing, calling for more stringent industry regulations by outside parties. The analysis, which was published in the journal Lancet,7 points out that aggressive marketing of health harming foods by multinational food companies is the driving factor behind global epidemics of chronic diseases like heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. Even more importantly, the researchers cited industry documents that reveal how companies are actively trying to affect health legislation and avoid regulation that might harm their bottom lines. As reported by Reuters:

“This is done by 'building financial and institutional relations' with health professionals, non-governmental organizations and health agencies, distorting research findings, and lobbying politicians to oppose health reforms... They cited analysis of published research which found systematic bias from industry funding: articles sponsored exclusively by food and drinks companies were between four and eight times more likely to have conclusions that favored the companies than those not sponsored by them.

'Regulation, or the threat of regulation, is the only way to change these transnational corporations,' wrote the researchers, led by Rob Moodie from the University of Melbourne in Australia. Ian Gilmore, special adviser on alcohol to Britain's Royal College of Physicians said the findings were 'a final nail in the coffin' of the idea that involving the alcohol industry in public health measures could work. 'Any government serious about public health should in future divorce its public health activities from industry involvement,' Gilmore, who was not involved in study, said in a statement.”

The Most Dangerous Food Additive on the Market: Are You Being Affected?

Unfortunately, aspartame toxicity is not well known by physicians, despite its frequency. Diagnosis is also hampered by the fact that it mimics several other common health conditions. It’s quite possible that you could be having a reaction to artificial sweeteners and not even know it, or be blaming it on another cause. To determine if you're having a reaction to artificial sweeteners, take the following steps:

Eliminate all artificial sweeteners from your diet for two weeks.

After two weeks of being artificial sweetener-free, reintroduce your artificial sweetener of choice in a significant quantity (about three servings daily).

Avoid other artificial sweeteners during this period.

Do this for one to three days and notice how you feel, especially as compared to when you were consuming no artificial sweeteners.

If you don't notice a difference in how you feel after re-introducing your primary artificial sweetener for a few days, it's a safe bet you're able to tolerate it acutely, meaning your body doesn't have an immediate, adverse response. However, this doesn't mean your health won't be damaged in the long run.

If you've been consuming more than one type of artificial sweetener, you can repeat steps 2 through 4 with the next one on your list.

If you do experience side effects from aspartame, please report it to the FDA (if you live in the United States) without delay. It's easy to make a report — just go to the FDA Consumer Complaint Coordinator page, find the phone number for your state, and make a call reporting your reaction.

Are You Addicted to Artificial Sweeteners?

Artificial sweeteners tend to trigger enhanced activity within your brain's pleasure centers, yet at the same time provide less actual satisfaction. This separation of the taste of sweetness from caloric content means that when you consume artificial sweeteners, your brain actually craves more of it because your body receives no satisfaction on a cellular level by the sugar imposter. This can actually contribute to not only overeating and weight gain, but also an addiction to artificial sweeteners.

In order to break free, be sure you address the emotional component to your food cravings using a tool such as the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT). More than any traditional or alternative method I have used or researched, EFT works to overcome food cravings and helps you reach dietary success. If diet soda is the culprit for you, be sure to check out Turbo Tapping, which is an extremely effective and simple tool to get rid of your soda addiction in a short amount of time.

If you still have cravings after trying EFT or Turbo Tapping, you may need to make some changes to your diet. My free nutrition plan can help you do this in a step-by-step fashion.

If you’re searching for a safer sweetener option, you could usestevia or Lo Han, both of which are safe natural sweeteners. Remember, if you struggle with high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes or extra weight, then you have insulin sensitivity issues and would likely benefit from avoiding ALL sweeteners.

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Surprising Health Hazards Associated with All-Fruit DietBy Dr. MercolaFebruary 11, 2013http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2013/02/11/all-fruit-diet.aspx?e_cid=20130211_DNL_art_1&utm_source=dnl&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20130211Fruits are loaded with healthy antioxidants, vitamins and minerals, which is why eating them in moderation is fine for healthy people. However, many benefit by restricting their fruit intake.Fructose, a simple sugar found in fruit, is preferentially metabolized to fat in your liver, and eating large amounts has been linked to negative metabolic and endocrine effects. So eating very large amounts – or worse, nothing but fruit– can logically increase your risk of a number of health conditions, from insulin and leptin resistance to cancer.For example, research has shown that pancreatic tumor cells use fructose, specifically, to divide and proliferate, thus speeding up the growth and spread of the cancer. As a general health rule, I recommend limiting your total fructose consumption to about 25 grams per day on average, and that includes fructose from fruit. However, if you have insulin resistance, heart disease, cancer or high blood pressure, you may want to cut it down to 15 grams or less.Kutcher Lands in Hospital After Adopting All-Fruit DietActor Ashton Kutcher recently disclosed health issues brought on by following an all-fruit diet, adopted in preparation to play the character of Steve Jobs in the upcoming film “Jobs,” due out April 19.
Jobs had adopted an all-fruit diet in his younger days, and even the brand he co-founded – Apple – was a nod to his dietary obsession. Kutcher recently told USA Today"First of all, the fruitarian diet can lead to like severe issues. I went to the hospital like two days before we started shooting the movie. I was like doubled over in pain. My pancreas levels were completely out of whack. It was really terrifying ... considering everything."The “everything” is likely a reference to pancreatic cancer – the disease that killed Steve Jobs on October 5, 2011, at the age of 56. Even though Jobs consumed a fruitarian diet years before he contracted his pancreatic cancer, there could be some relationship.Why Large Amounts of Fruit May Not Be Healthy
While people are becoming increasingly aware of the connection between excessive fructose consumption and obesity and chronic disease, many forget that fruit is a source of fructose as well. Many tend to believe that as long as fruit is natural and raw they can have unlimited quantities without experiencing any adverse metabolic effects.
Eliminating processed foods and soda – which are loaded with high fructose corn syrup – and replacing it with an all-fruit diet is likely not going to improve your health.
It’s important to consider ALL sources of fructose, and to try to limit your total consumption if you want to optimize your health. Granted, fruits contain beneficial dietary fibers, antioxidants, vitamins and minerals, which is why they’re an important part of a healthy diet – as long as they’re eaten in moderation. I believe most people would benefit by replacing the fruit with 50-70 percent of their calories from healthy fat. You also need moderate amounts of high quality protein.
An all-fruit diet is essentially an all-fructose diet, and this is bound to spell disaster for your health, at least long-term. Studies have shown that fructose can induce:
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Impaired glucose tolerance, insulin resistance, and diabetes

Elevated triglycerides

Abdominal obesity

Leptin resistance

Inflammation and oxidative stress

Endothelial dysfunction

Microvascular disease

Hyperuricemia

Renal (kidney) damage

Fatty liver disease

High blood pressure

Metabolic syndrome

__________________________________________________The Fructose Pancreatic Cancer ConnectionPancreatic cancer is one of the faster spreading cancers; only about four percent of patients can expect to survive five years after their diagnosis. Each year, about 44,000 new cases are diagnosed in the U.S., and 37,000 people die of the disease. Cancer of the pancreas has a terrible prognosis--half of all patients with locally advanced pancreatic cancer die within 10 months of the diagnosis; half of those in whom it has metastasized die within six months.
Your pancreas contains two types of glands: exocrine glands that produce enzymes that break down fats and proteins, and endocrine glands that make hormones like insulin that regulate sugar in your blood.
Steve Jobs died of tumors originating in the endocrine glands, which are among the rarer forms of pancreatic cancer. His cancer was detected during an abdominal scan in October 2003, as Fortune magazine reported in a 2008 cover story. He reportedly spent nine months on "alternative therapies," including what Fortune called "a special diet,” although there was no mention of what type of diet this might have been. In 2004, after the cancer had spread, Jobs opted for surgery. Unfortunately, it did not cure him.
Five years later, he underwent an experimental procedure called peptide receptor radionuclide therapy (PRRT), which involves delivering radiation to tumor cells by attaching one of two radioactive isotopes to a drug that mimics somatostatin, the hormone that regulates the entire endocrine system and the secretion of other hormones. This treatment also failed. After having a liver transplant, Jobs succumbed to the cancer in 2011.
Interestingly enough, research published in 2010 suggests fructose may have a particularly significant impact on pancreatic cancer. Insulin production is one of your pancreas’ main functions, used by your body to process blood sugar, and, in the laboratory, insulin promotes the growth of pancreatic cancer cells. However, there’s more to it than that. The research in question showed that the way the different sugars are metabolized (using different metabolic pathways) is of MAJOR consequence when it comes to feeding pancreatic cancer cells and making them proliferate. According to the authors:"Importantly, fructose and glucose metabolism are quite different... These findings show that cancer cells can readily metabolize fructose to increase proliferation."The study confirms the old adage that sugar feeds cancer – a finding that Dr. Warburg received a Nobel Prize for over 90 years ago. Tumor cells do thrive on glucose and do not possess the metabolic machinery to burn fat. However, the cells used fructose for cell division, speeding up the growth and spread of the cancer. If this difference isn't of major consequence, then I don't know what is. Whether you're simply interested in preventing cancer, or have cancer and want to live longer, you ignore these facts at your own risk.
There’s reasonable cause to suspect that if your body maintains high levels of insulin, you increase the pancreatic cancer's ability to survive and grow. In fact, researchers now believe that up to a third of all types of cancers may be caused by diet and lifestyle. So if you want to prevent cancer, or want to treat cancer, it is imperative that you keep your insulin levels as low as possible. Should You Eliminate Fruit from Your Diet?
Short answer, no, it wouldn’t be wise to eliminate fruit entirely. Fruit is definitely a source of fructose, and one that can harm your health if you eat it in vast quantities, but eating small amounts of whole fruits is fine if you are healthy. In vegetables and fruits, the fructose is mixed in with fiber, vitamins, minerals, enzymes, and beneficial phytonutrients, all of which help moderate the negative metabolic effects. However, if you suffer with any fructose-related health issues, such as insulin resistance, metabolic syndrome, heart disease, obesity or cancer, you would be wise to limit your total fructose consumption to 15 grams of fructose per day. This includes fructose from ALL sources, including whole fruit.If you are not insulin resistant, you may increase this to 25 grams of total fructose per day on average.If you received your fructose only from vegetables and fruits (where it originates) as most people did a century ago, you'd consume about 15 grams per day. Today the average is 73 grams per day which is nearly 500 percent higher a dose and our bodies simply can't tolerate that type of biochemical abuse. So please, carefully add your fruits based on the following table to keep your total fructose below 15-25 grams per day, depending on your current health status.

Fruit

Serving Size

Grams of Fructose

Fruit

Serving Size

Grams of Fructose

Boysenberries

1 cup

4.6

Limes

1 medium

0

Tangerine/mandarin orange

1 medium

4.8

Lemons

1 medium

0.6

Nectarine

1 medium

5.4

Cranberries

1 cup

0.7

Peach

1 medium

5.9

Passion fruit

1 medium

0.9

Orange (navel)

1 medium

6.1

Prune

1 medium

1.2

Papaya

1/2 medium

6.3

Guava

2 medium

2.2

Honeydew

1/8 of med. melon

6.7

Date (Deglet Noor style)

1 medium

2.6

Banana

1 medium

7.1

Cantaloupe

1/8 of med. melon

2.8

Blueberries

1 cup

7.4

Raspberries

1 cup

3.0

Date (Medjool)

1 medium

7.7

Clementine

1 medium

3.4

Apple (composite)

1 medium

9.5

Kiwifruit

1 medium

3.4

Persimmon

1 medium

10.6

Blackberries

1 cup

3.5

Watermelon

1/16 med. melon

11.3

Star fruit

1 medium

3.6

Pear

1 medium

11.8

Cherries, sweet

10

3.8

Raisins

1/4 cup

12.3

Strawberries

1 cup

3.8

Grapes, seedless (green or red)

1 cup

12.4

Cherries, sour

1 cup

4.0

Mango

1/2 medium

16.2

Pineapple

1 slice (3.5" x .75")

4.0

Apricots, dried

1 cup

16.4

Grapefruit, pink or red

1/2 medium

4.3

Figs, dried

1 cup

23.0

How to Determine Your Individual Susceptibility to Fructose Damage
As already stated, those who need to be careful about their fruit intake are people with high insulin levels. You can measure your fasting insulin level to find out for sure, but if you have any of the following problems it is highly likely you have insulin resistance syndrome:
Overweight
High Cholesterol
High Blood Pressure
Diabetes
Yeast Infections
Besides that, you can also use your uric acid levels as a marker for your susceptibility to fructose damage, as some people may be able to process fructose more efficiently than others. The higher your uric acid, the more sensitive you are to the effects of fructose. The safest range of uric acid appears to be between 3 and 5.5 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dl), and there appears to be a steady relationship between uric acid levels and blood pressure and cardiovascular risk, even down to the range of 3 to 4 mg/dl.
According to Dr. Richard Johnson, the ideal uric acid level is probably around 4 mg/dl for men and 3.5 mg/dl for women.
If you are one of those who believes that fruit is healthy no matter how much you eat, I would strongly encourage you to have your uric acid level checked to find out how sensitive you are to fructose. Eat the amount of fruit you feel is right for you for a few weeks and then check your uric acid level and see if your levels are healthy. If they are elevated you might try reducing the fruit to recommended levels and rechecking your uric acid level. Many who are overweight likely have uric acid levels well above 5.5. Some may even be closer to 10 or above. Measuring your uric acid levels is a very practical way to determine just how strict you need to be when it comes to your fructose – and fruit -- consumption.Is there Such a Thing as an Ideal Diet for Everyone?Nutritional requirements can vary wildly from one person to the next, which is why I’ve been a longtime proponent of eating in accordance with your nutritional type. For example, if you’re a protein type, fruits are generally not beneficial for you with the exception of coconut, which has a higher fat content that is beneficial for protein types. On the other hand, carbohydrate types tend to fare well with fruit and can safely consume moderate amounts. This is an important distinction, and everyone should try to eat primarily the specific fruits that are best for their unique biochemistry.
However, many find nutritional typing to be too complex. So to simplify matters, while still allowing for a fully personalized program, I recently updated and revised my Nutritional Plan. It consists of three levels, from beginners to advanced, and covers the basic requirements of a healthy diet.
Keep in mind that emerging evidence suggests your diet should be at least half healthy fat, and possibly as high as 70 percent. My personal diet is about 60-70 percent healthy fat, and both Paul Jaminet, PhD., author of Perfect Health Diet, and Dr. Ron Rosedale, M.D., an expert on treating diabetes through diet, agree that the ideal diet includes somewhere between 50-70 percent fat. It's important to understand that your body requires saturated fats from animal and vegetable sources (such as meat, dairy, certain oils, and tropical plants like coconut) for optimal functioning.
When you take this into account, it’s easy to see that an all-fruit diet could wreak absolute havoc with your health.
Keep in mind that frequent hunger may be a major clue that you're not eating correctly. Not only is it an indication that you're consuming the wrong types of food, but it's also a sign that you're likely consuming them in lopsided ratios for your individual biochemistry. Fat is far more satiating than carbs, so if you have cut down on carbs and feel ravenous, remember this is a sign that you haven't replaced them with sufficient amounts of fat. You do want to make sure you're adding the correct types of fat though, such as:

__________________________________________________If You Seek Optimal Health, Pay Careful Attention to Your Insulin LevelsThree lifestyle issues keep popping up on the radar when you look at what’s contributing to pancreatic cancer: sugar intake, lack of exercise, and vitamin D deficiency. Obesity and physical inactivity makes your body less sensitive to the glucose-lowering effects of insulin. Diminished sensitivity to insulin leads to higher blood levels of insulin, which in turn can increase your risk of pancreatic cancer.
It’s a no-brainer that an all-fruit diet can seriously jeopardize your insulin sensitivity, thereby raising your risk of any number of health problems, including pancreatic problems. It’s simply FAR too much fructose for most people. I personally developed diabetes when I tried the "Eat Right for Your Blood Type" diet, which included eating large amounts of fruit for breakfast. So please, be careful of any diet that seems to extreme, and remember the human body NEEDS healthful fats and high quality protein for proper functioning.
Remember to listen to your body over the long term to guide you as to the best food selections. If your energy level deceases, you have a difficult time maintaining your ideal weight or are hungry all the time, there is a good chance that you have yet to find the optimal fuel for your body. As for fruits, use caution if you have any kind of insulin related health issues, as discussed above, and limit your total fructose consumption to 15-25 grams of fructose per day, depending on your health status.